Between 3 and 5 times a day, we make the trek out to the cow to see if she is in labour. 

The signs are there. Her udder is enormous. Her back end is springing, but still we wait.

When we stopped milking her just over 2 months ago, we were done.  We'd been limping towards the end, feeding as much milk to the pigs as we kept.  I'd stopped making cheese over the summer anyway as our kitchen hits 40c/104f with the Rayburn on hot days. I'd stock piled butter in the freezer and cheese in he fridge and thought we would be ok to make it through.

The timing of her dry period was good. Cows need to be "dry" aka not producing milk for 60 days or so prior to calving to ensure its not too much of a drain on their condition. While we hadn't planned for her to calve in October as she arrived in calf, not having the added work of milking in August and September when we were busy and exhausted with the garden and events, worked well. The freedom of not having the milk and milk processing meant there was more time for rest.

At first it felt so freeing not to milk. We had all this extra time in our days. We had been milking cows twice a day for 2 years straight and not doing it was amazing. Kevin could stay in bed a bit later in the morning and I didn't have to work with my laptop next to the stove while I stirred cheese or churned butter.  Chore time was cut to less than half. 

Something shifted the last couple of weeks though. The convenience of buying in our milk, yoghurt and butter became an annoying hassle. When you've spent almost 2 years NOT needing to buy those things, the shift to remembering to grab milk at the store isn't any easy one. We haven't made pizza in weeks as every time I go to start it, I remember I've run out of homemade mozzarella in the freezer.

But now we are ready. The milk pails have been washed, the cheese press serviced. We study Honey's back end multiple times a day to see if there has been any change. We confer with each other about how we will fit milking in to the school run/shipping/busyness that is ahead of us. 

We are ready, but Honey is not. And so we wait...

...and hope that the other person remembers to pick up milk from the store when they are out.

See you soon, hopefully with baby pictures!!! 

Kat

Farm School News

Are you a member of the Gartur Stitch Farm School, our online learning platform? Our courses are hosted via Mighty Networks and it allows us to discuss topics, share resources and host live makealongs. With some long-awaited tech fixes happening with the platform, we are excited to give the platform a bit of a zhuzh and have some exciting plans and new courses.

But the most exciting thing is that we have hired our dear friend, Kerstin Grieve, to help mange the farm school, help us put more of our own recipes and tutorials "on paper" as well as sharing her own.

If you aren't a member, it is free and you get access to our free online course "Getting Started in Sourdough", so hop on over and join to see what we are talking about!